or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
 
More Buying Choices
24 used & new from £6.30
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
 
   
Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism
 
 
Share your own customer images
Search inside this book

Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism (Paperback)

by Paul Boghossian (Author)
3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
RRP: £10.99
Price: £8.49 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
You Save: £2.50 (23%)
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
In stock.
Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk. Gift-wrap available.

Want guaranteed delivery by Friday, November 13? Choose Express delivery at checkout. See Details
18 new from £6.30 6 used from £7.96
Other Editions: RRP: Our Price: Other Offers:
Hardcover £25.00 £23.75 10 used & new from £10.30

Special Offers and Product Promotions

Frequently Bought Together

Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism + The Construction of Social Reality + Social Constructionism
Price For All Three: £28.20

Show availability and delivery details

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

The Construction of Social Reality

The Construction of Social Reality

by John R Searle
4.3 out of 5 stars (6)  £7.12
Social Constructionism

Social Constructionism

by Vivien Burr
5.0 out of 5 stars (4)  £12.59
The Philosophy of Philosophy (Blackwell/Brown Lectures in Philosophy) (The Blackwell / Brown Lectures in Philosophy)

The Philosophy of Philosophy (Blackwell/Brown Lectures in Philosophy) (The Blackwell / Brown Lectures in Philosophy)

by Timothy Williamson
£15.19
Physicalism, or Something Near Enough (Princeton Monographs in Philosophy)

Physicalism, or Something Near Enough (Princeton Monographs in Philosophy)

by Jaegwon Kim
£10.13
Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do?

Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do?

by Michael Sandel
£8.97
› Explore similar items

Product details

  • Paperback: 148 pages
  • Publisher: Clarendon Press (11 Oct 2007)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0199230412
  • ISBN-13: 978-0199230419
  • Product Dimensions: 19.8 x 13.2 x 1 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 187,170 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #8 in  Books > Society, Politics & Philosophy > Philosophy > Schools of Thought > Relativism

    •  Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?

  • See Complete Table of Contents

Customers Viewing This Page May Be Interested in These Sponsored Links

  (What is this?)
   The Phobia Specialists opens new browser window
www.PhobiaGone.com  -  Anxiety, panic, fears & phobias cured. Very high success rate. 
  
 

Product Description

Simon Blackburn, Times Literary Supplement, 1 September 2006

'a thoroughly professional contribution' --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.


Review

If only Boghossian's eminently reasonable book were required reading for every freshman considering entrance into the humanities... (Ars Disputandi )

...lucid and effective ... (Times Literary Supplement )

This is a great book for a seminar or discussion group. And its about time that someone wrote it. Happily, it was someone with Boghossians clarity, verve, and panache. (Graham Priest, Review of Metaphysics )

...this is an important book that should be widely read. (Philosophers' Magazine )

This is a book that can be read in an afternoon and thought about for a lifetime. (Wall Street Journal )

...a tour de force: subtle and originalbut accessible enough to be read by anyone with an interest in the subject. (Wall Street Journal )

In both subject matter and execution, this book promises to become a small classic of philosophical analysis. (Choice )

For all its sophistication and erudition, the writing is remarkably clear, free of specialized jargon, and accessible to nonspecialist readers. (Choice )

...the book does a fine job of assessing in brief compass the sort of relativism/constructivism advocated by Rorty and his fellow travelers, and Boghossian's sophisticated and careful arguments against that Rortian view are often ingenious and invariably telling. (Harvey Siegel, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 25/07/07 )
See all Product Description
Inside This Book (Learn More)
Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
Search inside this book:

Tags Customers Associate with This Product

 (What's this?)
Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
 
(1)
(1)
(1)
(1)
(1)
(1)
(1)
(1)
See all 9 tags...

Your tags: Add your first tag
 
See most popular tags

What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism
95% buy the item featured on this page:
Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism 3.7 out of 5 stars (3)
£8.49
Constructivism: Theory, Perspectives, and Practice
3% buy
Constructivism: Theory, Perspectives, and Practice
£22.33
Why Truth Matters
1% buy
Why Truth Matters 3.9 out of 5 stars (7)
£11.89
Thought and Reality (Lines of Thought)
1% buy
Thought and Reality (Lines of Thought)
£8.99
Explore similar items
 

Customer Reviews

3 Reviews
5 star:
 (1)
4 star:
 (1)
3 star:    (0)
2 star:
 (1)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.7 out of 5 stars (3 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Good Counter to Specific Formulations of Relativism and Constructivism, 31 Aug 2009
By A. Montgomery - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
I read this book a couple of years ago, and as such apologize for any oversights that may result from this. In an objectivist counter to constructivism about facts, justification and rational explanation, Boghossian has provided an excellent counterbalance to the constructivist and relativist theories of knowledge taught or assumed in many English Literature and Sociology classrooms, and at the same time the specific arguments he makes will be of interest to undergraduates in Philosophy with an understanding of contemporary epistemology. The text is clear and doesn't presuppose very much knowledge of the subject, while containing a central argument and setting the bar high enough in defense of this argument to differentiate it from an introductory text.

Most of the problems I had with this text only arose from closer analysis, and in defense of the author this made it more interesting to grapple with and is most likely a result of the same short length that made it so readable in the first place. Occasionally it feels like the restricted positions that Boghossian argues against could be confused by the reader for the only formulation of constructivist or relativist positions. For example there are very obvious combinatorial positions that can be constructed, such as the acceptance of objectivism about facts, relativism about justification (relationalism) and objectivism about rational explanation. Because Boghossian sets up the argument from the fact-relativist position from which he argues justification-relativism emerges, it is too easy to slip into the assumption that relativism about justification cannot be justified independently of the first position. This is a problem since it is not clear that all the thinkers cited by the author (Kant, Wittgenstein and Putnam for example) accept the latter on the basis of the former, or even that they accept the former at all. An example of this is given on pg. 84 where the epistemic relativist is supposed to accept that there are 'no facts by virtue of which our particular system is more correct than any of the others', however this is not necessary for a weaker formulation of relativism that accepts only B or perhaps B and A of the positions given in this section, and to do so takes much of the sting out of the proceeding arguments. The reader could also assume that the 'equal validity' thesis is accepted by epistemic relativists and motivates their position when this is often not the case. These issues may seem trivial and merely the result of the necessary assumption of a particular set of relativist positions (where everything else is treated as non-relativism to avoid confusion), but since contextualism and the plethora of apparently 'tamed' relativistic positions in epistemology are becoming more dominant it is important to note that the counter-arguments Boghossian applies to the stronger formulations of relativism in this text often fail to apply to many of the more mainstream positions in contemporary analytic philosophy. This is because many of his arguments presuppose that one accepts all or at least most of the theses of relativism he lays out, rather than treating them as quite separable positions.

The obvious advantage of this is that Boghossian's focus highlights many of the core problems with the particular positions he is examining, and these positions are by no means irrelevant. Indeed, they are often treated as an unspoken assumptions by students from various disciplines and as such deserve to be heavily scrutinized. As an undergraduate I can't give anything like an expert opinion on the book, but it was refreshing to read after years of these assumptions being made unquestioningly in course texts, and has remained interesting and useful secondary reading since then. I believe it would make an ideal addition to the reading list of courses where there is a predominance of the kind of 'equal validity' views outlined in the opening chapters- exposing students to a rigorous critique this assumption.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
10 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars With such enemies, who needs friends?, 14 Nov 2006
This review is from: Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism (Hardcover)
A clearheaded critique of certain social constructivist tendencies would be a welcome contribution to the philosophical debate; unfortunately this book does not provide it. It consistently overstates the importance or relevance of some of the more outlandish ideas of individual 'relativists' and/or 'constructivists', thereby neglecting the bulk of the literature proposing entirely reasonable forms of 'social constructivism' (though they are rarely advertised under this label). Lack of familiarity breeds contempt, and so it should come as a no surprise that Boghossian makes little attempt to give the positions he criticises a charitable interpretation. What is more worrying, however, is that some of Boghossian's arguments are outright sloppy. (In some cases, he exploits an equivocation between an assertion of entailment and one of identity in order to force an argument to work -- hardly an argumentative move worthy of a philosopher of Boghossian's standing...) In the preface, Boghossian writes that he tried to make the book accessible beyond the narrow circle of academic philosophers. While this is a laudable goal, I am doubtful whether it suffices to justify (to mention but one example) delegating to a mere footnote problems with, e.g., the tripartite definition of knowledge (p. 16) -- when it is the stalemate arising from just such problems which has prompted many philosophers to seek a departure from traditional epistemology, e.g. along the lines of social epistemology (and for this one need not turn to Latour, Boghossian's favorite bogeyman, but to figures such as Edward Craig...) Finally, the timing for Boghossian's book is awkward. Any discerning observer of contemporary epistemology should by now have noticed that there is considerable rapprochement between different philosophical traditions, an increased awareness of the role of values in epistemology, new constructive uses of history in philosophy, all of which contributes to the project of philosophical inquiry rather than detracting from it. In summary, to paraphrase Bernard Williams, a work in philosophy may be unimaginative not because it fails to be clever but because it misses the point. Boghossian's book is a clear instance of that.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
6 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, 18 April 2006
This review is from: Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism (Hardcover)
Boghossian does an excellent job of dispersing a few popular but entirely gaseous philosophical ideas, exposing the fallacies or sheer lack of argument underlying much of them. There is a certain amount of technical language but that shouldn't prevent non-philosophers from following the argument.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)


Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Only search this product's reviews


Customer Discussions

This product's forum
Discussion Replies Latest Post
No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
 


Active discussions in related forums
   
Related forums

Listmania!

Create a Listmania! list

Look for similar items by category

Look for similar items by subject












i.e., each product must be in subject 1 AND subject 2 AND ...

Feedback

Ad

Your Recent History

 (What's this?)

After viewing product detail pages or search results, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in.